“Do sit down,” she said. “I will give you part of your coat.”
There was a tremulous note in her laugh, but as he seated himself, she spoke with great seriousness. “When two persons understand each other as well as you and I,” she said, “and are as near death as you and I, they need not be embarrassed by conventions.”
“We never have been very conventional with each other,” he replied, shakily. Her shoulder was against his. He could hear her breathing.
“Now tell me the rest of the story.”
“First I must change your notion that we are near death.”
He could feel that she was looking at him in the blackness. “Don’t you think I know?” she whispered. “They will not find us until to-morrow. There isn’t enough air to last. I have known it from the first.”
“Someone will open the door,” he replied. “We may have to stay here quite a while, but——”
“No, my friend. There is no likelihood that it will be opened. The clerks are leaving for the night.”
He was silent.
“So finish the story,” she went on.